


Vet Ben

by Happy_Cow



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Ableism, Baby Rey, Character Study, Childhood Friends, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Neurodiversity, No Plot/Plotless, Tags subject to a little change, Teen Ben, Unnecessary Facts about the Vietnam War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-04
Updated: 2019-09-10
Packaged: 2020-10-10 03:51:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20521493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Happy_Cow/pseuds/Happy_Cow
Summary: Once upon a time in Virginia, Rey made a very tall and very complicated friend.(Am trying to write other stories, so here is 'filler arc' I made a while ago. Based on Curious Case of a Dog in the Nighttime, and the peeple I used to know, and public television. Might get darker if I can justify it, but for now it is fluff.)





	1. Say You’re Sorry x Oh, Please x The Skywalker Burden x Ben

He was tall and he walked around in camo fatigues. I’d only been there for a few weeks when I decided that Virginia had some weird characters, and it was not a proper place for a child to live.

He saw me staring at him, and he stared back at me. “What're you looking at?” he spat, nasally.

I stuck my tongue out at him.

“Hey, that’s not very nice,” he said. He looked like the way I drew faces in art class: a long nose, a line for a mouth, and two big dots for eyes.

I wanted him to go away, so I turned away from the fence and pretended to weed Uncle Plutt’s lawn. It was a mild fall and brown, curly leaves littered everywhere.

“That’s not very nice,” he stated flatly. I gathered a fistful of crunchy leaves, but I could still feel him standing there. “Shouldn’t you be at school?” he asked.

I shook my head.

“_Hey_! Shouldn’t you be at school?” he repeated. I glanced up and he was leaning on the rusty wire fence. I noticed the weird, bulky backpack over his shoulders and the massive, muddied combat boots at his feet.

Annoyed, I threw my fistful of leaves in his face and stalked off.

The fence squealed. Some instinct kicked in my hind brain and I began running for my life. I zoomed around the house only for an anvil to _bodyslam_ me. My limbs flailed uselessly on the ground and raw noise tore out of my throat. The grass had a sweet smell; I’d never seen so much green before in my _life_, for Virginia was nothing like Arizona.

He flipped me over and trapped my arms in the iron grips of his hands.

Through the film of tears over my eyes, his mouth was a red hole. Thrash, scream, strain — nothing would save me. He was sitting on me and crushing the air out of my lungs, he was pushing my wrists into the sharp grass on the lawn. Spittle hit my face. After a while, I began to piece out words: “_SAY YOU’RE SORRY_! _SAY Y_OU’RE SORRY S_**AY YOU’RESORRY**__**!!**_” he screamed, over and over and over.

My throat hitched and threatened to close shut. The words left me in a whisper, over and over. His voice rang in my ears, long after the noise began to patter out.

xxxxx

The dragon bundled me up in his arms and took me to his lair.

It was dark, because there were two light sources: a rectangular window that looked out only a few inches over his front lawn, and a naked lightbulb on the ceiling. There were fist-sized holes in the dry wall. Hiccups kept tearing out of my throat and my eyes burned so bad. My body was numb all over; this felt like a nightmare.

The monster appeared again. After depositing me on his bed, he gave me a glass of water and a box of tissues. When he carried me over, I was too stunned to do anything about it; but now I flinched whenever he reached out to try and touch me.

“_Please stop crying_,” he blurted out for perhaps the third time. “_I’m sorry_. Please _stop_.” He looked at the clock on the wall and glanced at the door leading upstairs. He kept doing that more and more often.

I closed my eyes.

My throat spasmed in a hiccup, and then I counted back from ten.

My Mum taught me how to find this place, in darkness. She and Daddy could drink and fight as loud as they want, but nothing could reach me here. The Rey today will be dead tomorrow; I just have to make it to the next Rey. The next Rey will be better.

I opened my eyes and blinked away the tears.

The boy gazed back at me, his eyes round and dark. His jaw was slack. He was not a monster after all. “Wow,” he said.

I raised my hand to wipe at my eyes, but his fingers caught my wrist. He placed a tissue paper in my hands, then kneaded my shoulder as I wiped my face. “My... mother would do this whenever I lost my head,” he said. “I would’ve done this to you, but you were scared, I think.”

The tissue was softer than the back of my hand, and I wiped the snot from under my nose, too. A *hic*cup shook me.

“Yeah that’s what water is for,” he said, before patting his bear paw on my back.

xxxxx

The boy took another glance at the door, then sheepishly turned to look at me. “My uncle Luke was supposed to be home by now. He’s a lot... _better_ than me at, with people, than I am.”

He stood up, then seeing that I wasn’t standing up, he reached out his hand. “Let’s go upstairs. Unless you want me to carry you?” he asked.

I took his hand and slid off the bed.

My legs felt numb and cold, but I still had on my beat-up sneakers. The boy muttered ‘careful’ under his breath as we walked up the stairs and out of the basement. The upstairs was spartan — terribly clean with a bare minimum amount of furniture. There were some more holes in the dry wall. Outside of the windows filtered the pale light of an autumn evening, with the orange afterglow of streetlights just turning on.

“To be honest, I’m kinda glad that Uncle Luke isn’t here,” said the boy. “He would get really mad.” He looked down at me and smiled. “You’re my guest.” He looked proud of that, then considered the implications. “Do you want dinner or do you want me to take you home?”

I nodded without really listening.

“What does that mean? You have to say ‘dinner’ or ‘home’.”

I nodded and hiccuped at the same time.

“Hold up one finger if you want dinner, and two for home,” he said, demonstrating himself.

Oh. I frowned, thinking. A lot of times, I didn’t have any choice over what was happening. I did want dinner, but Uncle Plutt normally had some frozen dinners to pick at, or freezer-burnt fish nuggets. And I would have to make it myself. On the other hand, I was afraid and I didn’t want the tall boy to get angry again.

“You’re really quiet,” said the boy.

I released his hand and uncurled mine. I held up my pointer finger.

He reached out and grasped it gently between his thumb and forefinger, before pulling me to the kitchen.

xxxxx

Dinner wasn’t anything special, but the effort was fascinating. He heated some water in a pot on the stove and opened two containers of chicken Cup O’Noodles from a stack of pallets of chicken Cup O’Noodles.

I wouldn’t talk, but he tried: “You know, there’s a noodle soup that’s made from boiled beef bones. It’s called pho.”

I nodded.

“Its got rice noodles, and string beans, and basil sometimes. And all sorts of beef cuts. And MSG, which is the flavoring in here, too.” He tapped the side of his styrofoam chicken Cup O’Noodles. “It’s from Vietnam.”

I nodded again.

“My grandfather, Anakin Skywalker, fought there,” he said. “That’s where — this is his backpack,” he said, patting the monster strapped to his back. “He was an RTO — a radio telephone operator. He was really good with machines. He had to carry the radio on his back.”

The RTO’s job was to report conflicts or firefights to headquarters, which would in turn provide air or ground support to units engaged in conflict. Skywalker Senior had to learn the radiotelephone procedures (a six-week course) while acting as a rifleman when the situation arose, say on patrol. RTO's basically carried everything a rifleman would have plus a radio and its extra accessories for a 36-hour period. This meant spare handsets, antennas, and as many batteries as you think you would need (two spare batteries did the trick fine, especially if you were just playing-pretend).

I really wanted to see this mythical radio, but the soup water was done cooking my noodles. He gave me a plastic fork, and I ate in silence as he chatted about things that I can’t remember now.

xxxxx

He walked me back to my house because it was dark, and also because I got to hold his big hand some more. I could see the light from inside, meaning that Uncle Plutt was back from and for business. Internally, I was scared because ‘school’ would probably leave another robo-call for him to find: ‘We are calling to inform you that ‘Rey Niima’ has been reported for today as an unexcused absence.’

The boy glanced down and swung my hand a little. “Today was fun, wasn’t it?” he said aloud.

I nodded.

“... Thank you, for, listening to me,” he said. “I should’ve been in school, too, but I didn’t feel like it. I’m going to join the Army anyway. It was fun hanging out with you, though.”

I hesitated. I’d never been called ‘fun’ before. I opened my mouth, but only the shape of a ‘thank you’ came out.

“You can come back to my house anytime,” he said. “I’ll show you more of my grandfather’s equipment, and make you more food.”

I nodded.

“My name is Ben.” Ben shook my hand. “You don’t have to tell me yours if you don’t want to.”

Ben.

_Ben_! Ben, my first friend.

That night, Uncle Plutt beat me with the silver end of his belt and sent me to bed without dinner, but inside it was nice to have a friend.

I curled into my strange and frightening little bed, the one that was cold and big and smelled like mothballs, and shaped his name in my mouth.


	2. Ms. Maz x I Can Read! x Someday x You’ll Fall

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Me: 'oh gee, I'm so busy workin that maybe i'll post my fluffy filler,,'
> 
> also me: *dies for a week*
> 
> (i'm srry, of course there was more ~m~ )

Ms. Maz x I Can Read! x Someday x You’ll Fall

I was the most stupid girl in school. I was six and I couldn’t read and writing was hard. They put me in a class where I was older than everyone, and then I had to go see a Special Educator. This pale Mexican kid kept saying, “How hard is it to spell Rey?” and he would always knock me down out at recess when they were pretending to be fighter jets.

I made a second friend, and that was the Special Educator, but she was very very old and we didn’t have much in common. Her name was Maz and I believe she was black, but she was really orange in skintone. She had these really thick glasses, too. She was the most interesting lady I ever met — she said she was a pirate once, and she had a husband and a boyfriend! How scandalous! Her job was to try and get me to catch up better to the kids my age so I wouldn’t have to sit in the baby class anymore. I had to see her about one hour before the end of school every day.

I got down how to hold a pencil really quick, and math was easy-peasy. Maz was really impressed when I grasped the multiplication tables. Writing letters was a little harder: I kept reversing the way the letters looked. Maz printed out dashed-letter sheets and made me rewrite my name every day, until I saw Rey Niima spelled out in my dreams. Then I started doing writing assignments in a little journal about my day and who my friends were. Mistakes were marked in red pen.

Then came reading! That was the worst!

I liked Maz, but she said that I had to stop testing her. She said she had my doctor’s papers and Uncle Plutt’s word, and she said she knew that I could talk. So we would sit on the couch in her office and she would try to make me read aloud. She would sound out words and then stare at me, and I would stare back.

“Rey,” she would say, “I know I’m getting all up in your business about this. What is it? Are you afraid of me?”

No!

“We just need to know if you can read. Making mistakes is a natural part of that. ‘The d-og, misses, its bone...’ Your stubbornness only hurts you, not I.”

This was so difficult, because she took the fact that I couldn’t speak like a personal disappointment.

xxxxx

One day, Ms. Maz made me take the thin little picture books with me out of school. I got a reading sheet that needed a parent signature for every day, stapled to my journal, with discussion questions. Ms. Maz’s expectation was for Uncle Plutt to read them with me and confirm that I can read them at home, but there was a fat chance of that. Ms. Maz got seething mad and threatened me with detention every day if I didn’t get her stupid sheet signed. That certainly lit a fire under my ass.

After school, I took the sheet and the books with me, and then showed Ms. Maz’s written instructions to Ben at his house.

Ben read it, and then he looked at me and asked, “Can you read, Rey?”

I nodded. I tapped the box where I assumed that his signature would go.

“I’m not gonna sign it if you can’t read,” he said. “That would go against my integrity.”

We had a battle of wills, where I stared at him and he stared back at me.

“Show me the books,” he said.

I complied, handing the plastic sleeve of books to him.

“... Okay,” he said, after some minute perusal. “These are boring and useless books. This one is about a mouse! Mice are disgusting, Rey.”

Yeah, I mouthed.

“Here, I have better reading.” Ben got up and went to the one bookshelf in their living room. “This one is the easiest, and it has pictures.”

There was a man with his son piggybacking on his shoulders, and the man had his hand on a long black wall. He sat down beside me and sounded out each letter at the end of his long finger.

T H E. W A L L. by Eve Bunting. Not Eevee like the Pokémon.

After a while, I found myself snuggling against his side to look at the pictures better. I think he thought that I was trying to read, because he would trace over each sentence with his finger.

xxxxx

When he was done reading, Ben closed the book and sighed. He looked down at me, and I met his gaze, blinking sleepily. It wasn’t a contest this time. Ben just had nice, dark eyes.

Then he folded his chin into his neck and he looked like a turtle. My mouth folded into a crumpled smile.

“I’m gonna go there someday,” Ben said. He pat the book. “The Memorial. It’s in Washington DC, which is just North of here. I’ll get my driver’s license on summer break.”

Whoa.

“My grandfather’s name isn’t on the Wall — the stupid Department of Defense’s fault — but it’s still worth a visit.” He hesitated. “Would you like to go, too?”

I nodded.

“Okay, but on one condition.” He paused, thinking. “Before that happens, you have to read this book back to me.”

— What? That’s stupid.

“Give me your journal,” he said, ignoring my outrage. “I’ll sign it.”

I handed him my composition journal and flipped it to the assignment page. But before that, he flipped around and admired my handiwork. “Is your name ‘Aey’ or ‘Bey’?” he asked.

I slapped his sleeve.

“‘Mi freind Ben walks —‘ ‘walk’ has an l — ‘his bog’. Did you mean dog? You need to turn the b around. Also, you draw me really ugly, and that hurts my feelings.”

I slapped him harder.

“Why am I walking a dog? The only dog I know is Han’s dog, and his name is Chewie. He’s a chocolate labradoodle; he’s not a yellow footstool.”

I actually drew that and made the sentence because that was the assignment: ‘What does your friend do every day’. I couldn’t find any simple sentence to describe what Ben does. I also didn’t know what Ben did every day; my next sentence would be ‘Ben maykes soop’ and that’s about it. Also, the work didn’t need any relation to reality; Ms. Maz wasn’t omnipotent.

But Ben couldn’t read minds. “Whose ‘bog’ is this, Bey?” he asked.

Rey, I mouthed.

xxxxx

In the baby class, we also got to celebrate Thanksgiving. We made paper pilgrim hats and Indian headdresses from plastic feathers, and then we sat on the floor and watched an animated program about The First Thanksgiving on the tv. In the cafeteria, everybody got a slice of processed turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, and this weird green mush called ‘stuffing’. We went around and the teacher asked us what we were all thankful for.

The other kids said their mom and dad and their cat and dog. I just repeated what the kid before me said, but inside of me I felt a gulf opening.

At that time, every Sunday night at eight pm, I received a very important call. I’d wait by the phone beginning at 7:50 pm, and Uncle Plutt would grumble ominously about keeping it to less than half an hour (the landline bill, you see) before retreating to the bar for the night.

The phone would ring, I’d pick up, and Mum would say, “Hi, is this the Plutt residence?” And I would say, “No, it’s Rey’s house!!” And she would cry, “Hello, baby!!! It’s so good to hear you! Mummy’s missed you so much!”

First, she let me blather on about my week: school was horrible, Uncle Plutt was mean, and all the other children were bullies. I was always right — she always knew I was too smart for school, and her brother was always a stupid old man. I just had to endure it, like the strong women that Niimas’ were. But I always broke down and I would beg for her to take me back home to Arizona, and she would say ‘Soon, baby — soon.’

Mummy would talk about the stupid hobos at the rehab center, and then give me news about Daddy. She promised that as soon as his sentence was up, they would find me and come rescue me. I just had to sit tight and listen to Plutt and go to school, or else stupid Social Services would put me in a terrible orphanage where I would be raped.

She promised that we would be together again by Christmas.

I would be alone in November.


End file.
